Mentor coaching – I’ve written a book

Here’s what I learned

I’ve written a book this summer.  On mentor coaching (where a coach is observed and given feedback against a set of competencies).  Mentor coaching is what I am becoming known for.  If you want to find out more, you’ll have to wait until April for the final reveal.

In the meantime, here are my reflections about what I have learned along the way (recognising that there are still 6 months of the publishing process still to learn from!):

1. My years of blogging really helped me to just jump right in.
2. But my best chapters were the ones that I started from scratch rather than editing them from past blog posts.  They were harder to write, but they definitely turned out the best from a reader’s point of view.
3. If you know what you want to say, writing a business book doesn’t actually take all that long.  I started in late July, sent in my draft at the start of September and just sent the updated manuscript at the start of October. 
4. But you do need down-time from other work to be able to write it at that speed.  August is usually relatively quiet in my world, so I had the space to crack on with it.
5. And I wish I had built in some down-time at the end of the first draft – instead I felt as though I was in catch-up and I became totally under-resourced for a few weeks because I wasn’t taking enough time to recover.
6. I wish I had started with a more complete outline!  I never wrote outlines for essays either, so I’m following a pattern.  I could have saved myself restructuring time had I got that right at the beginning.  And yes, I should have known that!
7. I have often said that business books are too long.  They could say what they need to say in a handout.  I tried really hard not to over-inflate anything, but it’s tough when you don’t know what people know and don’t know – and when this is the first book on the subject as far as I know.  I had every intention of keeping mine short and sweet, but it turned out that I had more to say than I thought I did!  It’s still on the short side though, so I hope I haven’t broken my own rule.
8. Things that might seem obvious to us are not obvious to others, so it’s important to explain yourself well!  I had to fill in quite a few gaps along the way.  It makes me re-realise how unique we all are, with a ton of stuff that we know that we assume other people know but they don’t know.  That’s what makes us special, the stuff that we know that others do not.  I hope that doesn’t sound arrogant – it’s meant to be an encouragement to recognise what you know that other people don’t know and share that where it’s appropriate.
9. I learned huge amounts that I was unconsciously competent about.  For several chapters, I had to really dig deep – and have some good conversations with others – to figure out what I do and how I do it. 
10. Conversations really do help me get clarity.  So much better than trying to do that inside my head.  They also helped when I was stuck with good old writer’s block (or maybe it was just a little bit of procrastination).
11. People you wouldn’t expect offer to read the draft.  I had some wonderful offers, and I took them all up on it, as I wanted as much feedback as I could get.
12. I thought my grammar was good – I learned it needed a lot of brushing up! So many rules that I didn’t know and don’t remember ever being taught.
13. I hate doing references and citations and permission logs!  That was the most painful bit. 
14.  It can be scary to put yourself out there for scrutiny – but as Brene Brown says, you have to get in the arena if you want to learn and grow. 
15. Pressing send is the biggest weight-lifter ever!

So, if you have been thinking about writing a book for a while, maybe my learning will help get you kick-started. 

With the exception of the references, writing this mentor coaching book has been a blast.